Bears rally for MVC Tournament victory

NORMAL, Ill. – Missouri State scored an improbable 2-1 victory over Evansville in the opening round of today’s Missouri Valley Conference Tournament, shocking the Purple Aces with two runs in the bottom of the ninth.

Travis McComack’s sacrifice fly with the bases loaded and one out sent the winning run home and turned what looked like a deflating start to postseason play into perhaps a momentum-building victory.

“We’ve been struggling lately and I think this is going to be huge,” freshman center fielder Tate Matheny said. “It’s a confidence boost. We played the whole game and didn’t give up and that was big.”

Fourth-seeded MSU (31-21) advances to a winners’ bracket game at 7:30 p.m. Wednesday at Duffy Bass Field against the winner of today’s late game between top seed Illinois State and Bradley.

Until the ninth, MSU had done next-to-nothing against Evansville pitcher Kyle Lloyd, a long-time Bears tormentor. The Bears had only three hits through eight innings, but starter Nick Petree and relievers Matt Hall and Grant Gordon kept it close.

Finally, the Bears were able to break through against a pitcher who was 3-0 with a 1.50 ERA in his career against them. Matheny walked to lead off and made a daring dash to third – barely beating the throw – on Spencer Johnson’s single.

Matheny scored the tying run as third baseman Jonathan Ramon made the first two back-to-back fielding errors.

Lloyd stayed in the game and got a force out at home on Conor Smith’s bases-loaded grounder. McComack then delivered.

Evansville scored the game’s first run in the first inning on a two-out RBI single by Jason Hockemeyer.

Then the Bears had few threats against Lloyd, a 6-foot-7 junior who beat them 2-1 last month in Evansville with 12 strikeouts. That began a stretch in which MSU has scored three or fewer runs in 12 of its last 15 games with just three victories in that stretch.

This game was much like the others. Opportunities, when they did arise, were squandered.

MSU had a promising start to the fifth inning as Conor Smith walked and Travis McComack singled with no outs. But Joey Hawkins, in a bunting situation, pulled the bat back as both runners took off.

Evansville catcher Chris Pearson threw out McComack at second with Smith safe at third. Hawkins and Patrick Drake hit pop flies as the rare threat against Lloyd turned to dust.

An inning earlier, the Bears managed their first hit off Lloyd as Voit lined a single into left.

The Aces worked the count against Petree, from the start. Petree needed 26 pitches to get out of the first inning and threw 113 in his 6 1/3 innings – only the second time all season he didn’t work at least seven innings.

“I’m very happy with the result, but it was an awful day, to say the least, for me,” Petree said. “I didn’t have anything working for me.”

But the Bears’ all-America and reigning Collegiate Baseball national player of the year, kept it close by working out of jam after jam after the first inning before turning it over to freshman Matt Hall with one on and one out in the seventh.

Evansville (22-33) left eight runners on base and was 1-for-10 with runners in scoring position.

“We didn’t lose hope,” Petree said. “Finally we had something go our way in the ninth, were able to build off it and won the ballgame.”

The Bears, meanwhile, kept spinning their wheels against Lloyd. When MSU did threaten, it self-destructed like in the fifth or Evansville came up with a sparkling defensive play like in the seventh.

Voit walked to begin the inning and Keenen Maddox hit a liner that seemed destined to plug the gap. But right fielder Hockemeyer, on a full sprint to his right, made a fully-stretched diving catch.

About MSU Sports Central

Lyndal Scranton and Erin Bolen cover MSU sports teams for the News-Leader. Get their perspective on university sports throughout the season. Join in by clicking to comment on any of the blog entries below.